


The People That Care About You

by izumi2



Series: List of Questions (Civil War Team Iron Man) [22]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: BAMF Rhodey, Civil War Team Iron Man, Not Steve Friendly, Other, but no bashing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-09
Updated: 2020-04-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:42:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23561758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/izumi2/pseuds/izumi2
Summary: Rhodey was a third party that cared and couldn't help but notice that Peter and Tony had some unfortunate shared issues.Tony was in an unique position to understand Peter and his motivations.They wanted to honor Ben Parker and Ho Yinsen.~*~Almost forgot: moderated because of trolls.Civil War Team Iron Man
Relationships: Background Tony Stark/Stephen Strange, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: List of Questions (Civil War Team Iron Man) [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/879633
Comments: 61
Kudos: 748
Collections: Irondad and his Iron kids





	The People That Care About You

_** When was the last time they sang? ** _

When life seemed stable again, as stable as it could get, Rhodey couldn’t help but notice some really unfortunate similarities between Peter Parker and Tony Stark.

Most would guess: drinking, sex, drugs, not sleeping for several days straight and honestly? Rhodey wished it was any of that, even all of that. Less self-destructive.

Yep. Less. Self. Destructive.

But no, it was that irritating, worrisome ability to take the world’s woes as their fault. If the sun suddenly imploded on itself, Rhodey could picture Tony, all hunched and hugging himself, drinking himself sober, muttering that “he could have done something”.

Rhodey could still remember how his knees went weak with relief when Tony decided, all by his lonesome at that, to hire a therapist. The colonel was ready to throw a party with a thousand guests when he saw Tony prioritizing SI over the Avengers’ requests and more than willing to buy a ring and propose to Dr. Leonard Samson when Tony took a break to work on his car over Avengers and SI’s whatever. Something that he hadn’t done since before Afghanistan.

It was only when Peter started to hang around the Compound, after the whole Vulture debacle, that Rhodey started to have flashbacks.

Pursing his lips, Rhodey was having flashbacks of Tony post-Ultron… not post-Afghanistan…

Not wanting to go down that rabbit hole… again that is, the military man focused back on the main issue: a sixteen-year-old that somehow put the idea in his head that it was his **_responsibility_** to be fricking Atlas.

“Hey, Platypus.” Tony greeted cheerfully.

“Hey, Tones.”

He fell into step with the peppy billionaire. Ever since one Stephen Strange approached… by scheduling an appointment of all things which earned as much incredulity as brownie points, Tony had a stupid smile on his face. Rhodey even had a bet with Carol. He was cursing at himself because he knew that what he had to say would take it off the genius’ face, but…

“Hey, Tones.”

“Hey, Platypus?” The engineer raised an eyebrow at the repeat performance.

“We need to talk.”

“Oh, no, are you breaking up with me?” Tony’s lips twitched, unable to hold a fake heartbroken expression.

Rhodey suppressed his own amusement and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, it’s just not working out. It’s not you, it’s me.”

“Oh, woe is me. Where is my ice cream and Nicholas Sparks’ movies?”

And the charade was done. “Nicholas Sparks? What the hell, man?”

“You don’t get to judge me, Team Edward.”

Rhodey quickly looked around and lowered his voice as much as he could while still being intelligible. “You promised never to tell anyone.”

“I’m **_not_** telling anyone.” Tony smirked at him.

“Friday is still someone.”

 _“Don’t worry, Colonel-Man, my speakers are sealed.”_ But she had the same teasing tone as her creator and Rhodey could only groan to himself.

Tony chuckled to himself. “Ok, what is it?”

“It’s… about Peter.”

Like a button was pushed, the amusement drained all at once. “Is there something wrong?”

Rhodey wanted to say no, but that wasn’t quite true. “Look, you need to talk to him.”

“Why, what is going on?” the inventor had a deep frown, worry in every feature.

“Have you noticed that he behaves as if he is a president mom? Ok, horrible simile, but he acts as if he is responsible for the entire eastern coast like every little thing is his kid.”

“… what?”

The colonel sighed. “He acts as if every robbery and old lady that doesn’t have help crossing the street is his fault. That’s not healthy! I **_know_** that Doc Samson already covered **_that_** with you.” And Rhodey got as close as he would ever get to outright mention Tony’s mile long issues that were finally being addressed.

Tony sighed and sat in one of the couches. “I didn’t know much about Peter Parker going in. I knew about Spider-Man, his non-lethal approach, his stats like strength and speed… but… when he got his powers… like any teenager in the world, he took it for a spin. He wasn’t even thinking about going vigilante, just… impressing a girl and becoming popular in school.”

“And then something happened.” Rhodey concluded.

“And then this… petty thief passed by him and he didn’t stop him. Not his problem, right? It just so happens that Peter’s Uncle had followed him, concerned by the changes in his nephew that he raised since the age of four when his parents died in an airplane crash.”

Rhodey closed his eyes, already seeing the end. “And the petty thief…”

“Shot his uncle. I don’t know his Uncle’s exact last words but Peter once told me that he learned that… when you can do the things he could but didn’t and bad things happened around you, they happened because of you.”

The colonel gaped at his friend for what felt like hours. Unable to comprehend what… what… “You just **_agreed_** with him? Tony!”

“Hey! That was me a few days after a grieving mother accosted me about Ultron, alright? I just… I didn’t even know what to say to the kid and… I couldn’t even find the words to agree and disagree at the same time because me doing something about anything was what…” The inventor sighed, out of steam. “I need to talk to him, don’t I?”

Rhodey bit his lip. “You’re pretty much the only one he would hear. If it wasn’t for a complete accident his Aunt wouldn’t even know about Spider-Man and… look, I like Mrs. Parker, she is good at comforting him, but… she acts more like the Cool Aunt than the Nagging Mom. She is all squeals and… thumbs up about Spider-Man…”

“… how the hell did **_I_** get the Nagging Mom part?”

“When you were the only one aside from the kid’s Uncle that ever scolded him?”

Tony glared at him.

~*~

Tony never drove so slowly in his life. With a route and traffic guaranteeing that he would get there just as the bell rung, he was trying to rehearse the words… what words could truly reach a teenager that felt it was his fault that his father-figure died?

Shit.

Tony wasn’t good at this sort of thing. He wasn’t good with kids. Well… there was Harley, but **_that_** kid is so overflowing with common sense that it was ridiculous. Tony never met anyone at any age with their feet so on the ground. When his dad skipped town, Harley didn’t blame himself for it, he didn’t think that, “Oh, if only I was less of a brat…”, he blamed his dad, and only his dad for whatever shortcomings he had that made him the sort of man that would leave his kid and his pregnant wife.

But then again, Harley knew what retroflectors are… at the age of ten. And Peter managed to produce that web of his and the tensile strength of that thing… that dissolved by itself after a few hours because Peter had the foresight not to leave those things all over Queens… maybe he could do this. Peter was also a genius kid… right?

The inventor groaned. Tony wanted to introduce Harley to Peter and hope for the best and then just leave it at that **_so_** badly. But it wasn’t fair to expect a fourteen-year-old to talk sense into a sixteen-year-old, even Tony knew that much.

The bell of a school startled Tony so badly he almost jumped. Oh, the memories it evoked. How long ago he heard that sound? Ah, crap, he was getting old.

Spotting the familiar head of chocolate-brown hair, Tony shrugged and decided, meh, what the hell. Lowering the roof of his electric blue Bugatti Veyron and ignoring the shouts when the crowd’s attention shifted from the car to the driver, Tony leaned out.

“Getting in, loser, we’re going shopping!”

Peter’s head snapped up at the familiar voice. He was finishing his plans to finally build the Lego Death Star with Ned, when he spotted Mr. Stark. Freezing where he was, Peter only moved when Ned, almost breathless, pushed him forward. And then he was running. As fast as he dared in front of so many people.

The thought of getting into that car in front of everyone in his school was making him sweat, but the thought of pretending it wasn’t with him and ignoring Tony Stark was making him sweat even more.

So with a barely intelligible farewell to Ned, Peter reached Mr. Stark in a state of shock.

“Mr. Stark… what are you doing?” He whispered desperately.

“No way! Penis Parker? What the…”

Blanching when he recognized Flash’s voice, Peter hurriedly jumped inside the car.

“Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go…!”

Tony frowned at the direction of the voice but before he could open his mouth to demand who that was, Peter was shaking him. Considering the kid’s super strength, Tony was impressed at the restrain that the move just jarred him enough to get his attention back to Peter.

“Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go…!”

Raising an eyebrow that clearly said that they would have words, Tony obliged.

Peter didn’t dare to look back until they took their first turn. With a deep sigh, he relaxed in the leather seat, clutching his backpack like a lifeline.

“Put your seatbelt on.”

“Oh, right, right. Sorry.” The high schooler hurried to obey but Tony didn’t answer.

He was too horrified at the realization that, fuck… he _**was**_ the Nagging Mom.

~*~

Once his heartbeat returned to normal, Peter chanced a look at Mr. Stark… who was pale and gawking ahead.

“Uh… Mr. Stark? Are you alright?”

“Yep. So, how about ice-cream?” He almost squeaked out.

Peter blinked.

~*~

Back in the Compound, they were enjoying ridiculously sized sundaes that they probably shouldn’t have so close to dinner time.

“Ah… not that I… don’t want to hang around but… this was bit out of nowhere…?” Peter tried.

“Yeah… I needed to talk to you, and since it’s Friday…” Tony shrugged.

“Ok.” And the kid looked at him… all big eyes and expectant look and crap… Tony wanted to at least finish their sundaes but…

“We need to have a talk.”

The teenager’s eyes widened to an impossible size and he jumped out of his chair so fast that Tony blinked, and he wasn’t there.

“Uh, NO! No, please! Don’t. I... ugh… er… Uncle Ben already… we don’t… Mr. Stark... I’m… I’m not even dating anyone…”

And Tony, from gawking in confusion at the teen went to really slack jawed at that.

“Oh! NO! That’s not…” The inventor sighed to himself and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m not going to talk about sex. Could you please sit back down?”

Peter went back to his chair a little warily, but too relieved that he was wrong about the topic to question.

“So… what is this about?”

Tony bit his lip for the briefest of seconds before squaring his shoulders. “Peter… I trust you… I think you are a hero. Independently of Spider-Man, you, as Peter Parker.”

“… thank you, Mr. Stark.” Although still confused, Peter was clearly pleased and even a bit shy about it.

“That said… I need to tell you something.”

“Sure.” The kid shrugged.

Tony’s plan was actually to ask about his Uncle’s last words. His exact words.

But that also wasn’t fair. To ask Peter to trust him without a show of trust before. Maybe even more so than asking Harley to talk to Peter. It was on Tony to take the first step, to show that it was ok, that this was a safe place.

That wasn’t something learned through therapy. That was actually a lesson from Howard Stark and refined by Maria Stark. You want to command the room? You set the tone. You establish the subject and how much you share. Howard taught him how to make the other share more than he did. How to throw away useless information but in a way that made it seem like a confidence, a show of trust. Maria taught him that he could breach or make the limits, make it as a safe or as dangerous as he wanted. Most were hesitant to cross a hard-set line. It went against social protocols and no one wanted to get off a high horse.

Tony spent so many years using his own version, his own lessons in the effort not to even think about his parents, about his mom, that he threw all of it away with the Avengers. Irony. Especially considering the revelations in Siberia. If only he had listened to his parents, no one would manage to use them against him. Not Zemo and not Rogers. Not S.H.I.E.L.D or Romanoff. Sure, he would still get caught by surprise. No matter what, Tony couldn’t see how he should have expected something like **_that_** from Steve Rogers.

Not to say that all of it was a tool to manipulate others into compliance. If it was, Tony wouldn’t use it with Peter, his mom wouldn’t have used it so often with him. Hell, Tony wasn’t sure about who learned from whom, but Edwin Jarvis also used it.

He took a deep, calming breath. Tony never talked about it and he just knew that after today, he would have to at least mention it to Samson. But… it was the closest to what Peter needed and… it was time…

“How much do you know… about Afghanistan?”

At the word, Peter’s eyes widened even more than they did when he thought Tony wanted to give him The Talk.

“I… I… I was… f-first year of high school. When we started geopolitical classes… debate club… I… we were talking about… the value of soldiers… and the weaponizing of countries.”

Tony raised an eyebrow. He already knew where this was going but didn’t want to assume anything.

“You can say anything, Pete.”

Peter bit his lip before nodding. “How our troops no longer have the best they could versus how much our country really needed the power to destroy the world five times over. How the world, altogether, have the power to destroy itself twenty times over…”

Much to the teenager’s surprise, Mr. Stark just chuckled a bit.

“Sorry, this is no amusing subject. It’s just… I have been seeing a psychiatrist and the other day I found this really amusing quote… “Not even Jesus pleased everybody”, I think it was from a Brazilian. Did you know that for decades, there have been protesters at SI’s doors from the anti-war crowd? Left-wingers and hippies with flowers on their heads all holding signs to make love not war?”

“I… saw something like that in… uh… Pym Technologies, I think?”

“Yeah. You were too young to remember it with Stark Industries but guess what happened when I closed the weapons manufacturing division.”

Peter cringed. “Our military was under gunned. Gwen… uh…” he tried to ignore the knowing look Mr. Stark sent his blushing face. “Er… she is my biochem partner… her dad is a cop, a Captain… she… always had the best arguments. She didn’t say if she was in favor or against you closing the weapons division, just that… well… no one would be happy either way. People were unhappy when you were producing weapons and now people are unhappy that you’re not.”

“Not even Jesus pleased everybody.” Tony repeated with a wry grin.

Peter returned it a little hesitantly. “And then… you were in a weapons presentation in Afghanistan, but that wasn’t about either pro or against you producing weapons. It was just Obadiah Stane wanting SI for himself.”

“I have controlling shares and CEO position. SI’s profits alone wouldn’t allow him to wrestle control and if my forays with the media were anything to go by, he couldn’t use that either. Death it is.” Tony regretted the last part at Peter’s face. He sighed. “Is that all you know about it?”

“Uh… pretty much. I… didn’t want to pry.”

And Tony smiled. Peter Parker was the kind of hero that always was meant to be. Perhaps his initial motivation was guilt, perhaps it would always underline his every action, but ultimately, he was a good person for the sake of being a good person.

“When my convoy was attacked, I was hit by a Stark Industries bomb. Only it wasn’t one I put on the market. It was one of dad’s.”

The kid turned horrified eyes at him. “Mr. Stark… I’m so sorry, I…”

“Thank you. But, although morbid to the extreme, that was just a detail. I got shrapnel in my chest and I was operated on in a cave by a man named Ho Yinsen that was also a prisoner. He put a magnet in my chest, powered by a car battery, to keep the shrapnel away from my heart. **_That_** is the main character.”

The billionaire could see that Peter was struggling to ignore the “operated on in a cave” and regretted that Peter needed the context to fully understand his point.

“Ok…?”

“Ho Yinsen was from Gumira. Do you know where that is?” When Peter shook his head, Tony nodded. “I would be surprised if you did. It is a small village in Zimbabwe. It was also torpedoed by a Stark Industries missile sold in the black market.”

The teenager gawked at him.

“But Yinsen never blamed me. It wasn’t until I was out of there and back in the States that I ever learned about it. He lost his entire family there. And yet…”

Tony took another deep breath. It was as painful as it was back in 2008.

“The Ten Rings, a terrorist organization that was responsible for my captivity, wanted me to build them weapons. The car battery would last perhaps a week… and then Yinsen didn’t blame me, didn’t yell at me… he was perfectly pleasant and perfectly straightforward. He told me…

_“What you just saw… is your legacy, Stark. Your life’s work at the hands of those murderers. Is that how you want to go out? Is that the last act of defiance of the great Tony Stark? Or are you going to do something about it?”_

Peter was captivated. He never truly thought about what went on in that cave. Information about it was so disconnected. With a sharp intake of breath, Peter hastily rubbed his eyes. Mr. Stark went through all of it and yet news treated it like gossip, like an interesting piece to discuss at a few Sunday mornings and then they would move to Keeping Up with the Kardashians.

“He helped me build the first Iron Man… and then distracted the guards when they got inpatient. It was complete but needed time to initialize. He went out and gave me that time.”

A few tears escaped Peter and Tony leaned back. What was left of their sundaes slowly melting and condensation pooling at the base of the cup.

“His last words to me were… “Don’t waste it. Don’t waste your life.” And… for the longest time… I spat on that.”

Peter snapped his head up. “No, you didn’t! You… you became Iron Man, you saved so many people! You became a hero!”

Tony smiled. “Peter… may I ask… what your Uncle told you?”

Turning back to his sundae, the teen moved the straw a bit. He kept repeating the words, again and again, but… never like that. Never to someone whose experience was so much worse than his. Mr. Stark already knew the circumstances and what Peter could possibly say in his defense? Their experiences weren’t the least bit comparable.

Mr. Stark had his face rubbed on the fact that the weapons he thought were in American’s hands to protect Americans, were in the hands of terrorists that probably tortured him to give them more.

Peter was just a stupid kid that didn’t stop a mugger.

But his Uncle’s words were some that he was proud of. He was proud of having had Ben Parker for an uncle.

“With great power, comes great responsibility.”

“Was that before or after you started to show off?” It was asked softly. With much more tact than Tony ever used in his life.

The kid winced. “I… accidentally broke Flash’s arm… in basketball and the… hoop. May and Ben had to pay for it.”

Tony hummed in sympathy. “I think your Uncle would be the proudest man alive.”

“T-thanks, Mr. Stark.”

“I don’t think Yinsen loved me, especially not in the way your uncle loved you. But for some reason, the man seemed fond of me. In the “oh, this silly American amuses me” way.”

Peter blinked. “Uh… well… I don’t know about love. But I think he cared more than that. In his last words, he showed you that, didn’t he?”

The inventor smiled again. “Then how come I spent all these years chipping away at my own health? You should know what I mean. Being Spider-Man … is it safe?”

The teenager frowned in confusion. “Well… no. But it keeps others safe.”

“Do you think that this is what Yinsen meant, with not wasting my life? Being Iron Man? Because I think you’re right, for some inexplicable reason, Yinsen liked me. If it was just to rejoin his family, he could have provoked the Ten Rings into killing him a lot sooner, but he sacrificed himself for my sake at the moment where it would save my life, at the moment that it would make a difference for me.”

When he saw that Peter wasn’t understanding it, Tony met his eyes and held them. “Before that, in a conversation, he asked me if I had any family. And I said no. He called me “A man that has everything, and nothing.”. After all these years, I finally understood what he meant with “don’t waste your life”. He saw how empty I was, how my life was full of shallow and instantaneous gratification. Nothing with real meaning. I don’t think he was talking about Iron Man, I think he was talking about Tony Stark.”

“You think Ben was talking about Peter Parker.” Came through numb lips. His feelings and thoughts a jumbled mess.

“I think you had just hurt a school mate, that I’m pretty sure was the little jerk that called you “Penis Parker”, because you were so excited about the things you could do now. I think your uncle loved you more than anything in the world and would always love you and just didn’t want you to become someone that, one day, you couldn’t love anymore. And I think that’s what he meant when he told that “With great power, comes great responsibility”. Just like I believe that Yinsen wanted me to start truly living, to have meaning in my life instead of going about it like all that matters was money, sex and alcohol.”

The tears were coming in earnest now. “It… i-it was my…”

“You were fifteen-years-old, Peter. No matter how strong you were, no matter how fast you were or how fast you healed. You think that, for a second, your uncle would rather **_you_** faced down an armed mugger, even if you told him about all the things you could do, how you can bench press a car, do you think that he would have cowered behind you? Or shielded you?”

The silence stretched for so long that Tony feared that Peter would just leave and try to walk back to Queens… and the Compound was really far away from Queens.

“He would have tried to shield me…”

And Tony let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

They needed to talk more about it, Tony wanted to say that with his powers, it was easy to hurt people as Peter himself experienced it first-hand, even when they didn't mean it. That Johannesburg and Bucharest showed how controlling their own strenght and the reponsability of what it meant to be so much stronger than other people was important and that Tony believed this is what Ben meant. But for now, Tony asked for the check and let Peter gather himself. It was enough for today and the kid really needed to think about it on his own. They could meet again tomorrow.

“Tony?” Turning around they saw Stephen Strange at the door. “You need some time?” He glanced at Peter.

“Pete, you good? Happy will take you home, but if you want to stick around…”

“No, I… should get back. May wanted some Chinese…” The kid sniffed and offered a smile. He chanced a look at the casually dressed sorcerer at the door. “Uh… are you guys… uh…”

Tony smiled at him and then at Stephen. “I’m not wasting my life.”

**Author's Note:**

> First things first: I don't know much about Comics!May Parker, but MCU!May Parker strikes more as the Fun Aunt than the Nagging Mom, and yes, she was much more, "Oh, my God, you're Spider-Man! That's so cool!" than, "Oh, my God, you're Spider-Man! ARE YOU CRAZY?!". That doesn't make her better or worse as a parent in general terms, but it does mean that Tony was pretty much the only adult that truly scolded Peter for his actions as Spider-Man (no matter the opinions of taking the kid to Germany... and no, that was really horrible in my opinion but not the point right now). So this isn't me necessarily criticizing May. Just to address it.
> 
> ~*~
> 
> I truly believe Ben and Yinsen didn't mean for Peter and Tony to become some "heroes" using their respective abilities. They wanted for them to be happy, to have a meaningful life, to not hurt others. I think that is the true lesson of "great powers, great responsabilities".
> 
> And yet, it is understandable that Tony took it to mean that he should have died, and didn't for some reason...
> 
> And that Peter should be Spider-Man, risking his life to keep other people safe...
> 
> And as heroic as that is, because they are, I don't think that this is what Ben and Yinsen meant.


End file.
